Posted
by
Zonk
on Thursday November 09, 2006 @07:53PM
from the tastes-like-chicken-or-so-i've-heard dept.

Jearil writes "Wired's 'Table of Malcontents' blog links to an article about a wine-tasting robot that thinks humans taste like bacon. The Japanese robot is intended to act as a personal sommelier, suggesting wines, cheeses, and hors d'oeuvres based on its owners personal tastes. It also apparently thinks humans would be tasty as part of a sandwich." From the article: "Let the robot holocaust commence: robots think we taste like bacon ... Upon being given a sample, he will speak up in a childlike voice and identify what he has just been fed. The idea is that wineries can tell if a wine is authentic without even opening the bottle, amongst other more obscure uses ... like 'tell me what this strange grayish lump at the back of my freezer is/was.' But when some smart aleck reporter placed his hand in the robot's omnivorous clanking jaw, he was identified as bacon. A cameraman then tried and was identified as prosciutto." This is most distressing.

If there are no Polynesian cannibals in your area, ask a soldier or fireman what burning human flesh smells like.

We smell like pork when we're well-done. The robot got it absolutely right. And I, for one, would like to remind the robot that I'm absolutely delicious when served with some fava beans and a nice chianti.

One thing is certain, the repetitive jokes will soon be here. And I for one welcome our new "I for one welcome..."-joke-setting-up overlords. I'd like to remind them that as a trusted Slashdotter I can be helpful in rounding up others to toil in their underground repetitive-joke-comment caves (as if they need it).

Say, they didn't happen to give us that cameraman's name? Where to find him, perhaps? He sounds like the kind of guy I'd love to meat. Er, meet. He sounds like maybe he could use a comforting olive oil bath, and then relax on a bed of mozarella and fresh basil.

This is seriously why I don't dine on swine. Back on the farm I grew up on from time to time we'd have to cut up a pig for whatever reason and the way pig's flesh looks when being cut open looks EXACTLY like human flesh being cut, and it's haunted me for years. Pigs are just too close to people in my mind.

The Aztecs had a long legacy of cannibalism as part of their religious ceremonies. It was considered (I assume by those not experiencing it) an honor to be killed and eaten as a token to their god(s).

After the Spanish came and forcefully converted the native American survivors to Roman Catholocism, the Aztecs adopted the stigma attached to cannibalism. However, they couldn't get enough of that porcine protein brought over from Europe. When asked about their focused consumption of pigs, the former people eaters replied with a simple answer: pigs taste like you and me.

Humans and pigs are actually fairly close anatomically, which is why high school students dissect pig fetuses every year and why pigs are a promising species in the field of Xenotransplantation [wikipedia.org]. And it's really not distressing at all, after you get over the ick factor. We're not made of magical fairy dust... we are flesh and bone just like any other mammal, and it seems reasonable to believe that animals which are similar anatomically would have similar compounds that generate similar tastes.

Really, there's nothing to worry about, since as Asimov pointed out in his story "Reason [wikipedia.org]" (1941), the robots are not likely to find pork appealing: "There is no master but the Master, and QT-1 is his prophet.";-) (My friend is a Muslim, so I can make this joke... I think.)

True story. I was having radiosurgery to remove a birthmark a couple of years ago. Essentially it burns off the skin in a way that allows it to heal with no scarring. I'm dosed up with Novocain and am lying down trying not think of whats going on a few inches from my eyes. Suddenly it smells like burning pork. I think to myself "What the hell is burning." A moment later I realized it was me.

We're a lot closer to swine than most would imagine, pigskin has been used for xenografts for human burn victims and of course pig heart valves have been implanted into people. Rumor even has it that we taste about the same, ever heard the saying, "humans, the other pork" or the term long-pig?

Considering what tofu products vegetarians have deluded themselves into thinking taste like bacon, cheese, hamburger, etc., I'm guessing that cannibals would probably find it offensive and just kill and eat you as a substitute if you offered it to them.

That begs the question: Why did the robot overlords in the Matrix farm humans; why not farm pigs? Certainly the matrix would have been a whole lot easier to program if it was just a giant mud pit. They also wouldn't have had to worry about Mr Uno... er Neo.

Being a savory pork flavor and all, I figured calling tasty human steaks "The Other Other White Meat" would be the perfect catch phrase to start the Marketing kickoff for the North American Human Meat Producers Alliance with. But, then I realized that Africans, Asians and Native Americans would get upset because it's so "white-centric".

See how polarized we've become on the race card?So I guess we'll just have to play into it.

Humans: The Black, White, Red and Yellow Meat, Taste the Rainbow Next to Your Potatoes

Also, why would a winery doubt the authenticity of their own wine? Is this in case someone breaks in and steals their wine, but replaces it with an exact duplicate?

Wineries that are still using real corks might be able to tell if a wine has been tainted with trichloroanisole (cork taint) before shipping the wine. About 5% to 10% of wines with corks get cork taint, and wineries would rather that bad bottles not make it into the hands of the consumer.